Pro Bowl Sunday Funday

The 3rd annual Pro Bowl in the non-conference drafting format took place this Sunday on the last day of the month of January. Over the past decade, the Pro Bowl has been taking some heat on whether or not the game should be eliminated from existence. The Pro Bowl moved to ESPN from NBC and that effected the amount of people who watched the "All-star" game. According to NBC analysis, the Pro Bowl drew a 5.0 overnight rating. That’s down from 5.6 last year and significantly down from the 6.7 rating the Pro Bowl got in 2014 when it was on NBC. This is the lowest rating the game has ever received. However, even with the game receiving the lowest rating of all time or the game, there was still millions of people watching it, and as long as people still watch the game it will still exist. 

I believe there are plenty of pros and cons to the game being in existence where it evens out to keep the game around. The biggest positive I saw about the game is how fun the people who participate in the game have while playing. A few things that stuck with me with how fun the game must be for those apart of it starts Richard Sherman dropping an RKO, a professional wrestler's signature move, on fellow star Clay Matthews. The reaction of the players on the field was priceless with a ton of laughter and smiles as Sherman failed to even getting close to taking down the large bodied linebacker Matthews. Another thing that really stood out to me is that young superstar best friends Jarvis Landry and Odell Beckham Jr. had a blast being reunited as teammates on the Team Rice. Another positive about the pro bowl is that younger studs start to get recognized and recruited to join older veterans players to come join their hometown squad.

Negatives about the game is of course the level of competitiveness. As the years go on the level of competition has dropped making fans and some players not want to watch and play in the game. This partly has to do with the fact that none of the players want to get injured or injure a fellow colleague during the game. Another negative is the cost for the game. Eighty-eight people play in the game with forty-four on each team. Each person involved on the winning team received $61,000. Is that too much money to give away on a game in talked of being no more? The losing team received half as much roughly $30,000. Another fact is how much it cost to send each player and personnel to the game, advertising, streaming the game, ect. There is a lot of money going into the game, and the major question being brought up; Is the game worth the time, money, and effort worth the game being in existence?